Rise of the Lustful Evil Monarch (Re)-Chapter 492: Radiant Dawn Lights Up The Abyss (1)
Third Person’s POV
No matter how hard he fought, the hands did not loosen.
The water crept higher and swallowed him inch by inch, until even his neck sank beneath the bone chilling and soul freezing darkness of the lake.
The foul sensation of it made his skin crawl, as though the water itself was alive and hostile.
His eyes burned and watered while his vision blurred as fear overtook every fibre of his being.
His chest tightened painfully, and his breath came in broken gasps, yet no amount of effort changed his fate.
Slowly and inevitably, his head was soon dragged beneath the surface.
Black water rushed into his mouth, and he swallowed an unknown amount of the filthy, freezing liquid.
It clawed its way down his throat and numbed his insides while spreading an icy corruption through his body and mind.
He felt as though every inch of him was being polluted and defiled beyond any hope of recovery, and yet, despite all of that, his original thirst did not fade.
Instead, the foul, chilling water only seemed to make it worse.
The thirst became even sharper, more unbearable and twisted into something unnatural.
As he was dragged deeper and deeper into the unknown depths below, a chorus of chaotic, harsh voices suddenly began to whisper inside his mind.
They overlapped and echoed as they scraped against his thoughts like rusted blades.
The voices seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once as they surrounded his already blurry consciousness, making it impossible to pinpoint their source.
He could not decipher the strange, foul language they spoke at first, but as the whispers continued, their meaning slowly became clear and seeped into his thoughts whether he wished it or not.
’Submit to us, boy... You can do nothing to resist this world.
We can quench your burning thirst and relieve your pain.
We can tell you who you are, and you will soon become one of us, never to feel that loneliness and thirst again...’
The whispers grew closer and more intimate, as though speaking directly into his soul.
’Submit to us, boy... submit to us... submit to me...’
The whispers grew louder and louder and soon merged into a single, overwhelming chorus that soon drowned out all other sensations.
They pressed against his mind from every direction and deafened his already blurred senses, forcing his scattered thoughts to fixate solely on them.
Somewhere deep within his fading consciousness, a small and fragile part of his mind tried to resist these voices.
It seemed to warn him that this was extremely dangerous and that if he failed to cling to whatever remained of his sense of self amid this relentless mental assault, he would suffer terribly.
That faint inner voice insisted that the consequences would be irreversible and that he would regret this moment for the rest of his life, if there was any life left to regret at all.
But that warning was very weak and distant.
It was quickly smothered beneath the overwhelming thirst burning through him, the crushing sensation of mental and physical suffocation tightening around his existence, and the unbearable feeling of filth and revulsion clinging to every part of him.
The disgust weighed heavily on his thoughts and eroded his resistance until even the instinct to struggle felt meaningless.
As the voices continued to gather inside his mind, layering over one another, he finally let go.
And the exact moment he did that, unknown to him, a multitude of black, slimy tentacles surged into his mind space.
Their number was vast and bordered on infinite as it writhed and spread as they invaded every corner of the dark mental expanse, like some ancient space monster scouring a dark galaxy.
They moved with unnatural intent and started scouring every inch of that vast inner world, searching for something hidden in the depths of a space whose very existence the current Ethan did not even seem to be aware of.
At the same time, in the outside world, Altheria, the little duchess, and Isha, the white dragoness, arrived at Eagle Peak, situated at the corner of the Sanctum Realm.
But the instant they landed at the prison entrance where the deacons had previously thrown Ethan, both of them froze.
Their expressions shifted sharply and darkened in unison as a terrible realization washed over them.
Without speaking, they exchanged a glance that conveyed a shared understanding that they were still too late, as what they had feared had already come to pass, and it had arrived far sooner, and far deadlier, than either of them had anticipated.
In their minds, they had never imagined that the old fogey Dajjal could be driven to such desperation.
It became painfully clear that they had gravely underestimated Ethan’s importance in his eyes.
Earlier, they had believed that they might have overestimated their own protective instincts toward Ethan, but now they realised how mistaken that assumption had been.
In truth, they had erred completely in understanding just how significant Ethan truly was in that old demon’s eyes.
The blue barrier covering the prison remained intact and eerily serene, showing no sign of disturbance, as though nothing at all had occurred in the past half hour since Ethan had been placed inside, but they knew better.
Without hesitation, they stepped forward and passed through the seemingly solid barrier as if it did not exist, appearing instantly within the chamber.
At the same time, the intruder inside had clearly already detected their presence.
A pair of red eyes and cerulean eyes met a pair of coal black ones belonging to a medium-height figure clad in dark robes.
He stood beside Ethan, whose body sat slumped and unconscious, leaning weakly against the black stone wall of the prison.
Twin black horns curved prominently from the head of the robed figure, unmistakably marking his identity as a dark demon.
A black cloth concealed the lower half of his face, while his coal-black eyes, completely devoid of whites, stared back at them with chilling calm.
